#husks of empty accounts

[powerfulkicks]

*in a half fugue state* a discord server as an ever changing house

[mostlysignssomeportents]

How the kleptocrats and oligarchs hunt civil society groups to the ends of the Earth

It's a great time to be an oligarch! If you have accumulated a great fortune and wish to put whatever great crime lies behind it behind you, there is an army of fixers, lickspittles, thugs, reputation-launderers, procurers, henchmen, and other enablers who have turnkey solutions for laundering your reputation and keeping the unwashed from building a guillotine outside the gates of your compound.

The field of International Relations has studied the enemies of the Klept in detail: the Transnational Activist Network is a well-documented phenomenon. But far more poorly understood is the Transnational Uncivil Society Network, who will polish any turd of sufficient wealth to a high, professional gloss.

These TUSNs are the subject of a new, timely scholarly paper by Alexander Cooley, John Heathershaw and Ricard Soares de Oliveira: "Transnational Uncivil Society Networks: kleptocracy’s global fightback against liberal activism," published in last month's European Journal of International Relations:

https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:5e5a3052-c693-4991-a7cc-bc2b47134467/download_file?file_format=application%2Fpdf&safe_filename=Cooley_et_al_2023_transnational_uncivil_society.pdf&type_of_work=Journal+article

The authors document how a collection of institutions – some coercive, others organized around good works – allow kleptocrats to take power, keep power, and use power. This includes "wealth managers, company providers, accounting firms, and international bankers" who create the complex financial structures that obscure the klept's wealth. It also includes "second citizenship managers and lawyers" that facilitate the klept's transnational nature, both to provide access to un-looted, prosperous places to visit, and boltholes to escape to in the face of coup or reform. It includes the real-estate brokers and other asset facilitators, who turn whole precincts of the world's greatest cities into empty safe-deposit boxes in the sky, while ensuring that footlose criminal elites always have a penthouse to perch in when they take a break from the desiccated husks they've drained dry back home.

Of course, it also includes the PR managers and philanthropic ventures that allow the klept to launder their reputation, to make themselves synonymous with good deeds rather than mass murder. Think here of how the Sacklers used charity to turn their family name into a synonym for culture and fine art, rather than death by opioid overdose:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/11/justice-delayed/#justice-redeemed

Beyond providing comfort to "Politically Exposed Persons" and "High Net-Worth Individuals," TUSNs are concerned with neutralizing TANs. Activists in these transnational networks play an inside-outside game: in-country activists will recruit peers abroad to bring attention to the crimes of their local kleptocrats. These overseas partners target the klept in the places they go to play and spend, spoiling their fun – and if they succeed in getting corrupt leaders censured abroad, then in-country activists can leverage that bad press to fight the klept at home.

To fight this "Boomerang Effect," TUSNs seek to burnish corrupt officials' reputations abroad, getting their names on humanitarian prizes, beloved sports teams, cultural institutions and great universities. They seek to capture international governance institutions that might wrong-foot kleptocrats, co-opting them to enable and even celebrate looters.

When it comes to elite philanthropy, TUSNs are necessarily selective. Kleptocrats' foundations don't fund anti-kleptocratic groups – they stick to "education, public health, the environment and the arts." These domains steer clear of human rights questions that might implicate their benefactors. Russian oligarchs love children's charities and disability rights – provided they don't target the Russian state.

If charitable giving is reputation laundering's carrot, then "reputation management" is the laundry's stick. Think of organized copyfraudsters who clone websites that have criticized their clients, then backdate the articles, then accuse the originals of infringing copyright in order to get them de-listed from Google or taken offline altogether:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/23/reputation-laundry/#dark-ops

Reputation managers also spend a lot of time in court. In the UK – the world's leader in libel tourism, thanks to a legal system designed to let posh monsters sue muckraking journalists into silence – Russian oligarchs have perfected the art of forcing their critics to shut up and go away:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/03/04/londongrad/#enablers

Indeed, London is a one-stop shop for the global klept, a place were forelock-tugging Renfields will buy you a Mayfair mansion under cover of a numbered company, sue your critics into silence, funnel your money into an anonymous Channel Islands account:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/01/07/the-klept/#pep

They'll sell you whole galleriesworth of "fine art" that you can have relocated to a climate-controlled container in a Swiss or Irish freeport:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/07/14/poesy-the-monster-slayer/#moneylab

They'll give your thick-as-pigshit progeny a PhD and never check to see whether he wrote his thesis himself:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LSE%E2%80%93Gaddafi_affair

Then they'll hook you up with a cyber-arms dealer to hunt your enemies by capturing their devices:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/07/27/gas-on-the-fire/#a-safe-place-for-dangerous-ideas

But don't let Brexit stop you from shopping for bargains on the continent. The Golden Passports of the EU – available in a variety of flavors, from Maltese to Cypriot to Portuguese – offer the discerning failson access to the luxury good shops and fleshpots of 27 advanced economies, making it a favorite of the Khmer Riche – the junior klept of Cambodia's ruling faction:

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/cambodia-hunsen-wealth/

But golden passports are for amateurs. Skilled klepts travel on diplomatic passports, which offer the twin benefits of free movement and consequence-free criminality, thanks to diplomatic immunity. The former Kazakh dictator's son-in-law enjoyed a freewheeling diplomatic life in Vienna; one daughters of the dictator of Tajikistan had a jolly time as an envoy to DC; another, to London (where else?).

All this globetrotting serves a second purpose: when rival elites seize power back home and force the old guard into exile, those ex-monsters can show up in the lands they called their second homes and apply for asylum. It turns out that even bomb-the-boats UK will welcome any asylum seeker who enters via the private jet terminal at City Airport (to be fair, these "refugees" have extensive properties in Zone 1 and country places in the Home Counties, so they won't need housing).

This stuff works. After Kazakh state goons murdered at least 14 protesters at a Zhanaozen oil facility in 2011, human rights groups around the world took up the cause. But they were effectively neutralized by TUSNs, with former UK PM Tony Blair writing on behalf of the Kazakh government to the EU condemning any kind of international investigation into the mass killings (add "former Prime Ministers" to the list of commodities for sale in the UK to sufficiently well-resourced murderer).

The authors close their paper with two case-studies. The first is of the daughters of Uzbek dictator Islam Karimov, Gulnara and Lola. And President Karimov was indeed a dictator: he trapped his population within his borders, forced them to use unconvertible scrip in place of money, and ordered the murder of hundreds of peaceful protesters, plunging the country into international isolation.

But while Uzbeks were sealed within their borders, Gulnara Karimov became an international player, running a complex network of businesses that mixed the products of the nation's oilfields with her family's fortune. She solicited – and received – bribes from Teliasonera, MTS and Vimpelcom, who were all vying for the contract to provide service in Uzbekistan. All told, she extracted more than $1b in bribes, laundering them through Latvia, Hong Kong and New York. She acquired real-estate in France and Switzerland, and her spree continued until her father collaborated with Uzbek security to seize her assets and place her under house-arrest.

Lola Karimova-Tillyaeva was Gulnara's estranged younger sister. She and her husband Timur Tillyaev ran the Dubai-based SecureTrade, which did extensive business with "opaque Scottish Limited Partnerships," laundering more than $127m in a single year to offshore accounts in the UAE and Switzerland. They acquired many luxe assets – a jet, a Californian villa, and an LA perfumier.

Lola styled herself as the face of the Karimovas abroad, a "philanthropist and cultural ambassador." She was a UNESCO ambassador and commissioned works of monumental art – and also sued the shit out of news outlets that reported factual matters about her family repressive activity at home. She organized AIDS charities in the name of Uzbekistan – even as her father was imprisoning a writer for publishing a book explaining how to have safer sex.

The second case-study is on Isabel dos Santos, "Africa's richest woman," daughter of Angolan dictator Jose Eduardo dos Santos. Isabel's vast fortune stemmed from her personal capture of vast swathes of the third-largest economy in Africa: "telecommunications, banking, diamonds, real estate and cement, among many others." Isabel enjoyed seemingly limitless access to state credit and co-investment, and was given first crack at newly deregulated industries. Foreign firms that invested in Angola were required to "partner" with Isabel's businesses.

Isabel claimed to be a "self-made woman" – a claim credulously parroted by the western press, including the FT. She used her homegrown fortune to become a major player abroad, especially in Portugal, where she was represented by the leading Portuguese law-firm PLMJ. Her enablers are who's who of corruption-loving lickspittles: McKinsey, Ernst and Young, Boston Consulting Group, and the Spanish BigLaw firm Uri Menendez.

Isabel cultivated a public facade of philanthropic giving and public spirited activism, serving as head of the Angolan Red Cross. She attended Davos and spoke at the LSE (she was also invited to Oxford, but her invitation was subsequently rescinded). On social media, she dismissed critics of her wealth and corruption as "colonialists," decrying their "racism" and "prejudice."

Isabel dos Santos's corrupt sources of wealth were finally, irrefutably exposed through the Luanda Leaks, in which the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists mapped the network of "top banks, management consultants and legal firms that were central to dos Santos’s operations."

Both case studies shed light on the network of brilliant, driven enablers and procurers without whom the world's greatest monsters would falter. It's a rare window on a secretive world, one that is poorly understood even by its inhabitants. As Michael Mechanic wrote in Jackpot, his 2021 book on vast, intergenerational fortunes, the winners of the lucky orifice lottery often lack any real understanding of how The Money is structured, grown and protected:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/13/public-interest-pharma/#affluenza

This point was reiterated by Abigail Disney, in a brave piece on what it's like to grow up subject to the oversight of these millionaires who babysit the children of billionaires:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/19/dynastic-wealth/#caste

This is an important contribution to the literature. We naturally focus on the ultrawealthy individuals whose reputations and fortunes are the subject of so much attention, but without the TUSNs, they would be largely helpless.

Going to Burning Man? Catch me on Tuesday at 2:40pm on the Center Camp Stage for a talk about enshittification and how to reverse it; on Wednesday at noon, I'm hosting Dr Patrick Ball at Liminal Labs (6:15/F) for a talk on using statistics to prove high-level culpability in the recruitment of child soldiers.

On September 6 at 7pm, I'll be hosting Naomi Klein at the LA Public Library for the launch of Doppelganger.

On September 12 at 7pm, I'll be at Toronto's Another Story Bookshop with my new book The Internet Con: How to Seize the Means of Computation.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/24/launderers-enforcers-bagmen/#procurers

Image: Sam Valadi (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photos/132084522@N05/17086570218/

CC BY 2.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

--

Colin (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Palace_of_Westminster_from_the_dome_on_Methodist_Central_Hall_(cropped).jpg

CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en

[colemacgrathtkz]

Thank you, @emositecc

[Lyrics]

Husk: "Your fanfic's bad and you've hit a writer's block.

All your ideas seem freakin stupid.

Your whole mind's empty and you're thinking you're a hack.

Can't post a chapter cuz it's so mid.

One hate comment- makes you take your account down.

Well, let me just say, you're a clown!"

Angel Dust: "Wait, what?"

Husk: "You're a writer, mootsie. A writer writing fanfics. You write cringe filled little Mary sues."

Angel: "DUH!"

Husk: "You're an artist just like me."

Angel: "Your art sucks!" >:(

Husk: " You're a peoples pleaser. Got only one kudos from userer 'Loonlover69_Simper'. And they liked it, you see." :3

Angel: "That's just one comment! I want more!!" :(

Husk: " There was a time I thought that no could relate to the haters this artist is facing.

But practicing more.. it can make our slow burns great.

It's not other numbers we should be facing."

Angel: "There's one comment.... that said my writing's sh#t!" >:(

Husk: " That doesn't mean it can't be lit!

Let's collab, man!

We're both artists, buddy. We're artists. It's ok to start with...."

Angel: " Bad grammar? Sucky flow?"

Husk: " You'd still get art from me."<3

Angel: " I'm a writer and crazy for crackfics, kinks and cliches. But at least I warn when I write p@#n."

Both: "You're an artist just like me."

Husk: "I draw all the ships I'm stannin."

Angel: "I write all the tropes they're hatin.

Enemies to lovers is my jam!"

Husk: "Go ahead, let me see your drafts, come on!"

Angel: "They get together in chapter four."

Husk: "I'll draw you fan art; just make me more!

Even if there's no comments.."

Both: "We'll keep on breaking lore. Who needs a shower??????"

Angel: "You're an artist, mootsie."

Husk: " An artist, and just maybe if we...."

Both: " make stuff together, we'll be so much more happy."

Husk: "It's time to lose your self-loathing.

Just make art, go have fun and mootsie.

Post your ic!

Ignore the icks!"

Both: " An artist....

just....

like...."

Shark demon: "There's they are!

They like Hazbin?!?!

SHOOT EM!!"

[radioisntdead]

Buon giorno or Buona notte dearest!!

I have another request heheheh

Think of this : Angel and the gang go out for another trust exercise, and they see an add for one if m!readers concerts.

Since Angel is a fan, he asks to go with the group as a bonding experience, which Charlie says yes too

They go together, and m!reader is getting ready, when they see Angel and think he's quite cute, not knowing him from his ahem, works and they sing a love song (Heavy metal lover by Lady Gaga) and Angel almost has a heart attack.

(It's mostly the ; 'I could be your girl,girl,girl' part that I get inspired from)

At some point Val starts being a weirdo, and then m!reader publicly shits on him in front of their entire audience, and he leaves after getting taken away by a few of m!readers fans

And it ends happily ever after with them together forever :D

(Readers music vibe is like odetari, ayesha erotica, asteria, etc)

If you could do this, it would make my summer!!

Love

-XIN🌹💝

Good evening my dearest Xin! I had so much fun writing this, my apologies it took awhile to write but I hope you enjoy it!

Backstage passes

Angel dust x M! Reader

Warnings: Valentino gets ripped apart, literally. Reader is low-key like the dazzlings from MLP, also I imagine the reader died via Bell accident like that evil dude from Disney's coco

Song used [I listened to this song so much while writing that it actually made me sick LMAO]

You appeared in hell overnight after dying from an unfortunate and totally not planned stage accident, involving a bell, everything you had worked so hard for gone within a mere moment.

Filled with rage and the confidence of someone desperate to thrive in the spotlight, you began to conquer the music scene of hell.

You climbed the ranks and crushed those beneath you, if you weren't so focused on gaining fame instead of plain ol' power you'd give a couple of overlords a good run for their money.

You captured the attention of hell's finest, sinners and hellborn alike wanted to book you for their events, concerts were sold out within seconds, stan accounts on hell's Twitter servers would beef with those who opposed you, music edits were made of you, memes and clips, mildly disturbing fanfiction was written, you were an icon.

Along with catching the attention of hell's finest, you gained Angel dust as a fan.

Your music would be playing in the clubs he went to, sometimes played during his drag shows, he'd use it as background for whatever thoughts he disassociated away to whenever Valentino was having his way, or he'd just listen to your music when he was alone.

And so when Charlie somehow managed to get the entire hotel front row tickets to your show after he mentioned it's make a good group exercise, he was ecstatic!

The group waited outside, Charlie and Vaggie were trying to secure a place for them in line, Alastor would rather died again then attend so his ticket went to Cherri, Husk had found the bar, Niffty was terrorizing some sinners by cleaning, Sir Pentious was... Sir Pentious-ing Cherri bomb, and that left Angel dust to wonder around until the show began, stumbling into a nearby store to grab some snacks.

You on the other hand sneaked out to go to the convenience store near by the concert venue in full performance outfit covered by an oversized coat and hood just to grab a slushie and a light snack because with all the dancing you were going to be doing, you couldn't do on a empty stomach but not a too full one or you'd puke!

And that's where you saw him, purchasing a couple of things.

You had a little thing for cute things, and Angel dust seemed to fall into that category, for you anyways, for most of hell's people, they usually tended to put him into a more... Exploitive one,

It wouldn't hurt for you to make one of your people drop off a couple of backstage passes for that spider, after your show right?

Or better yet maybe you could do it yourself?

The concert venue was filled with sinners and hellborn alike from all types of backgrounds, all there to see you perform.

Including a couple of overlords.

Angel's eyes bounced around the stage waiting for your arrival.

Soon enough the bright lights dimmed and more colorful ones took their place.

Lights, smoke, action.

Heavy metal lover

Heavy metal lover

Heavy metal lover

It was starting.

Heavy metal lover Heavy metal lover

You came up from a platform under the stage smoke coming out with you as the music began, microphone in hand, and eyes closed shut.

Heavy metal lover

Heavy metal lover

Heavy metal lover

Heavy metal lover

Your eyes shot open as you began to move, background dancers were moving in sync, all eyes were on you.

Heavy metal lover

Heavy metal lover

Heavy metal lover

Heavy metal lover

Dressed in black and neons you practically glowed in the dark atmosphere,

"I want your whiskey mouth all over my blonde south," your voice rang out throughout the venue causing some members of the audience to scream out your name.

You struggled to hold back a filthy grin.

"Red wine, cheap perfume, and a filthy pout," you walked out onto the stage front and center, lights following you in all your leather-y glory, the backstage passes in your sleeve crinkled.

"Tonight bring all your friends, because a group does it better," Angel dust's eyes were locked onto you much like everyone's else's, like they were hypnotized.

"Why river with a pair? Let's have a full house of leather," Oh how you adored being the center of attention, you looked at the crowd, eyes glancing over everyone, a mild shiver of disgust went through you when you accidentally locked eyes with what looked to be a grape flavored moth.

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

You quickly moved your eyes away to continue looking for a certain spider, honestly your attachment to see a sinner you only saw for five seconds tops in a convenience store was interesting.

What was even more interesting was your ability to avoid the explicit ads for the films he did, seriously they were everywhere in hell! Including said convenience store!

"Heavy metal lover,"

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

"Heavy metal lover,"

As you walked across the stage you kept your eyes on the audience,

Searching..

Searching..

And you found him!

Right in the front row, how did you not see him before?

"Dirty pony, I can't wait to hose you down," your eyes locked on him as his locked on yours.

Did that count as a horrible, HORRIBLE pickup line or was that just poorly timed?

"You've got to earn your leather in this part of town," it seems someone hadn't seen the poison music video! You flared out your own leather jacket, the shiny gems on it sparkling in the dark.

"Dirty pearls and a patch for all the Rivington Rebels," you winked at him before turning on your heel as your background dancers circled around you with all sorts of dancing.

"Let's raise hell in the streets, drink beer and get into trouble,"

You danced and your background dancers mimicked in perfect coordination.

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

"Heavy metal lover,"

You began strutting to the center of the stage.

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

You leaned down and went into what I can only describe as a sensual army crawl but without relying on your elbows to crawl.

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

You moved towards Angel dust.

"Heavy metal lover,"

You reached out an arm towards him, gently tugging on his bowtie to pull him closer to the stage, once he was close enough you touched his face, his eyes were wide and his heart was nearly pounding out of his fluffy spider chest, you his all time favorite singer was touching his face.

"I could be your girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl,"

Within seconds you moved your arm just enough to loosen the backstage passes from your sleeve and have them fall into your hand.

"But would you love me if I ruled the world, world, world?"

You tucked the tickets into the front of his shirt where his chest fluff was located, being careful not to accidently grope the spider.

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

You gave a wink before flipping yourself onto your back and throwing yourself up and strutting back to the middle of the stage as your performers danced around you.

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

Unfortunately a certain moth witnessed your little flirt, with his best pornstar? He didn't think so.

Without alerting the other two Vees who were actually focused on the show itself he marched his way through the crowd.

Heavy metal lover

"Whip me, slap me, punk funk, New York clubbers, bump drunk,"

Shoving audience members to the side, causing some to crash into each other and tumble like dominoes, grabbing the attention of others.

"Bud Light, liquors, bar slam, move it, this is your jam"

Of course that caught your attention, and you didn't appreciate someone stepping out and stealing the attention that belonged to you! That you deserved and worked so hard for!

"Wash the night with St. Jameson, Like a baptism, heavy metal lovers play,"

You took a couple of steps towards the side of the stage where he was.

"Baby, we were born this way''

"Uh oh, it seems a shiny headed purple man is trying to wreck the show! We can't exactly have that now can we?"

You could barely hear whatever words he was saying, in your prospective it was like a grape yappin' away.

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

With a wave of your hand the crowd grabbed onto him, lifting him up and pulling him through, landing him in the cannibal section.

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

Grabbing onto his limbs and pulling them apart, teeth were sunk into him pulling at his purple flesh.

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

Attention was back on you, as it should be.

No one paid mind to Valentino's screams as if they couldn't hear it or as if it wasn't happening at all, completely and utterly enamoured with you and your music.

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

Heavy metal lover

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

Neither of the Vee's would notice he was gone until hours after the show, no one would notice the blood scattered on the floor until late at night when they were cleaning up the messes, and no one would know what exactly happened to him until he eventually respawn, having lost everything.

Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh

Heavy metal lover

What a scary power you possessed, even if you didn't completely realize you had it.

But that wasn't the focus here, because as if nothing ever happened you went back to flirting with Angel dust from the stage.

"I could be your girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, but would you love me if I ruled the world, world, world?"

Eventually the show would end, and you'd wait anxiously backstage until that spider came, cashing in that backstage pass you shamelessly gave him from the stage, followed by the princess of hell herself moments later trying to get you to join her hotel.

Heavy metal lover Heavy metal lover, Heavy metal lover

And what else could you do then accept her invitation to join her little hazbin hotel, although you were anything but a hazbin.

And if you did manage to get past the pearly gates, you already had earth and hell alike in a chokehold, imagine what you'd accomplish if you performed in heaven?

Heavy metal lover, Heavy metal lover

It was a good chance to get to know Angel dust as well, the two of you would go from friends to something more.

Heavy metal lover

Friends to lovers was such a a underrated trope wasn't it?

Heavy metal lover

It wouldn't hurt to lean a little more into romantic songs, especially if you went the more cheesy route and played for Angel alone.

Heavy metal lover, Heavy metal lover, Heavy metal lover

You couldn't wait for the chance to shamelessly flirt with him while you were on stage again.

Heavy metal lover, Heavy metal lover

Good evening folks! I hope you enjoyed! I know my posting schedule has been a little wonky [side eyeing the Wednesday angst being posted on Thursdays] my bad, there's some personal stuff going on, plus I've been feeling a little sick but hopefully everything will be a little more organized this week! As always thank you for tuning on in, goodnight!

[hurtmyfavsthanks]

I love the idea of ‘feel good’ whump where whumpee feels amazing and that’s what makes it tragic. another example of this would be like, solider adjacent characters are in some sort of mission on enemy turf, trying to escape out of a labyrinth to earn their freedom, there’s a catch. instead of subduing heavy duty nitrous plus some other recreational gas is being pumped into the area. just the way the team would entirely unravel is perfect. stoic warriors reduced to a giggling husk as they try to continue onwards, only to forget what they were there for in the first place.

bonus points if enemy warriors come in and contain them, by simply playing along with the whumpee’s fantasies.

You absolutely get it! Yes! YES!

There’s something so…insidious about this idea (POSITIVE). I love the idea of them just trapped there like rats in a maze, succumbing to something they know is there but can do nothing to stop. They don’t know where the exit is, they don’t have anything to deal with an airborne toxin, they can’t simply stop breathing. All they can do is cup shaking hands around their mouths and pray it’ll be enough to buy them some time.

There’s one specific detail I like about this scenario! It’s inefficient in one specific aspect, the simple fact that you can’t account for different tolerance levels with an airborne chemical. It’l hit some harder than others, faster than others, leaving some stumbling into delirium before others begin to feel anything. It’s a slow process; a creeping, looming threat that’s terribly slow but impossible to outrun.

And I love that.

Imagine the helplessness of it. Watching your teammates falling apart around you; their determined steps replaced by a dazed stumble, looks of worry swept away by a blank smiles and empty eyes. Watching your once composed allies fall into a hazy madness, consumed by fits of giggles and chemical calm. Seeing confusion falling over everyone, and being just aware enough to feel that same pressure against your own mind. Looking at everyone falling apart around you and knowing you’ll follow suit. That you might already be too far gone and not even realize it.

Imagine Leader being the last one standing, alone despite the people around them. Forced to watch their friends falling apart, made defenseless by whatever Whumper was pumping into the air. Knowing that they’re the last line of defense between Whumper and their teammates.

The first to go was Whumpee. They’ve always been small, lithe where others were bulky. They’d used that to their advantage in the past, but now it only means they were the first to begin to lose themselves.

They’d crumbled about half an hour before, dissolving into a fit of giggles so unlike themselves that it’d left everyone shocked. The dazed smile on their face, blissed out and uncaring of Caretaker’s worried expression, was their first sign of how dire their situation was.

Leader had no choice but to carry them now, not trusting Whumpee’s legs to support them. Whumpee-–prideful, stubborn, competent Whumpee—was tucked into their arms like a child, head leaning heavily against Leader’s chest. They were babbling sleepily in Leader’s arms, the waterfall of incomprehensible words the only sign they were still conscious.

Caretaker isn’t doing much better. They’re still standing at least, still aware enough to follow after Leader, still in control of their own mind. But every few minutes Leader had to remind them to keep their mouth covered, the memory of their situation seeming to flow out of their mind like water. Caretaker’s eyes had grown hazy, their steps clumsy in a way that filled Leader with dread.

Leader doesn’t know how much longer Caretaker will last. Leader doesn’t know how long they’ll last, forced to breathe in the same air that had taken down their team. What they do know is that their team is depending on them.

They need to get everyone to safety. The thought is an anchor, a single goal holding them steady against the waves of dizziness starting to blur their vision. They can hear Whumpee murmuring against their chest, see the distance in Caretaker’s eyes. Leader knows that they’re the only one who can save them.

Leader holds onto that thought. They hold onto it even as a haze falls over them, as poison slips through the cracks in their mind and melts away at their awareness. The environment around them becomes a blur, endless halls Leader can’t seem to recognize anymore. They forget why they were trying to take shallow breaths, forget where they are in the first place, forget why they’d ever come to such a confusing place. They only know that Whumpee is limp in their arms, that Caretaker is stumbling alongside them barely able to stand, and that they have to save their team. Everything but that one goal has been washed away.

So it’s a relief when they finally find someone. A pair of men who speak with authority and confidence, who seem to know how to escape. They promise to lead the team aout, and the relief Leader feels at their words shatters what little concentration they had left. A laugh bursts from their lips, relief and the chemicals in their lungs filling their head with a wave of dizzy giddiness. That single, anchoring thought has been uprooted, leaving their mind adrift in the glow of a job well done.

Leader doesn’t recognize the men’s uniform, nor do they ever question where they came from. There’s no room left in their head to notice the smug smirks masquerading as smiles, to realize the ill intent hidden behind the guise of safety. All they can see is the promise of safety for their team.

They don’t resist when their hand is draped over someone’s shoulder, body suddenly too heavy to stand on their own. They don’t respond as Whumpee and Caretaker are carried alongside them, just as boneless. Leader’s mind drifts as they’re lead away.

[chaifootsteps]

it’s so bizarre who I use to be all about Angel and husk back in the day, but now I hate it. I hate how aggressive the official accounts are about it and making these cringe posts

I hate how viv doesn’t know how to write mlm relationships, she ruined the ship. It’s like that nasty huskerdust cocktail at the premiere, that perfectly embodies the ship.

No wonder fans go crazy with headcanons the show just feels so empty there’s just a lot of wasted potential.

Husk is a hypocritical asshole who gives Angel shit about everything even stuff he isn’t gonna do like drugs or have sex with strangers on their last day. I thought he was gonna be the character that people drop their shit on and he’d either flip you off and tell you get your shit together or drop some good as advice, which happened but we don’t fucking see it and he uses the stuff they told him in private or worse drunk to call them out like fuck you. If Angel told husk stuff in private, husk doesn’t get to use that shit against him

Angel is just rape fetish porn that the writers don’t take seriously or get off to it, they swept so much of his character development under the rug either because they didn’t know how to handle SA topics without the pop filters or didn’t think it through. This is the character that viv claimed she put the most love and work in and that was a fucking lie, we were just told he’s getting better and don’t show him getting better. He doesn’t even apologize to husk for the uncomfortable sexual harassment and unwanted sexual advances.

Their situations are absolutely not the same, yeah they sold their souls but for different reasons. Alastor isn’t as bad as valentino, not even close. The only thing he does is make husk work at a bar and was chummy with him in the pilot and even made it worth husk’s wild by giving him free alcohol that husk accepts

I just hate it

As someone who used to absolutely, unconditionally love Stolitz?

[imagionationstation]

Greetings!

I've made plenty of AU's by far, and often make it known on your account. Specifically, you may know me for Oroku A and B (AU of which either A-Team and B-Team were raised by Oroku Saki, a.k.a the Shredder), and my Skewered Two AU (human Leo and Raph, half human Donnie and Mikey)— though, had you pay attention, you may notice how all these AU's had something in common, that being it centers around the B-Team.

See, I love the B-Team. Especially Donatello, since he's my favourite, but Mikey comes second.

I adore them, in fact.

But I'm craving for angst now, so they got to suffer.

They got to die, actually. Temporarily, pronto.

Therefore— Empty Graves AU.

One thing I notice from the 2012 series was how both Donatello and Michelangelo had, one way or another, died in a certain way that there wasn't a body for the two eldest to bury. Albeit temporarily, only for a little while, they died nevertheless— and died with no remnants of themselves left.

Michelangelo got disintergrated by lightning and Donatello got molecularly scattered. It was only by sheer luck that they were brought back to life. A miracle, in fact. They didn't survive the initial impact, only somehow able to avoid the aftermath.

But what if fate isn't so kind?

What if they stayed dead?

Leo and Raph would have to confront the fact that they have to bury their little brothers— but they also have to face the fact that the graves are very much empty whenver they're visitting. There's no body in there; the only evidence of their little brothers— their poor, little baby brothers— ever existing was the cluttered mess of their rooms. Piles upon piles of mold-infested pizza boxes and failed or progressive inventions and Ice Cream Kitty and what's left of Metalhead.

But no little brothers.

The icing on top was the notes they left prior to their demise.

Mikey was eating pizzas, a whole box, in fact— and left a note on it before tossing the box into the fridge when they have to leave. A small note, saying, "Mikey's Pizza! No touch >:(" on top. There were some crumbs here and there, and the box is soiled from the grease. Raphael even jokingly said that he's going to finish it when they got home.

But now? The box remained untouched in the fridge. Even after it starts to grow bad, or had a small infestation on it— no one had the heart to throw it out, instead prompting to keave it be 'just in case'.

Donnie was going through his checklist before he had to divert all his attention into helping April. He had a whole list of what he had to do and what he's planning to do, all in alphabetised order, clipped on his clipboard. He even had a big bold red marker written, "I'll get on this later, promise!", before he had to chase after April.

Now, a week later, those checklists remained unchecked. His inventions abandoned, and the lab became what once a safe haven for their resident genius to an empty husk of who once owned it.

Leo and Raph grows increasingly violent each days— there's no more little brothers to voice out their concern, or cry for help, or whine or ground them– making sure they're not too ambitious and stays in the present— no one to question their violent decision or risks. They chase after whoever that had took their baby brothers from them, even cutting April O'Neil from their life, saying that if she got kidnapped again, it's her problem.

Little did they know, their little brothers never did left them. Physically, perhaps, but not in spirits. It also didn't quite dawned on the two youngest that they're dead — that no one can see them — so they don't understand why neither of their older brothers seem to acknowledge their existence. They don't understand why neither Leo nor Raph talks to them anymore, and couldn't help but to apologise and beg and questions why.

April did see them, though. She sees how Donnie and Mikey tried to get their attention, their spirits not once dimming. She would've told them, had it not been for the fact that the Hamato Family wouldn't even look her way.

Remember when I said 'temporarily'? Yeah— I'm not a huge fan for 'Major Character Death PERMANENTLY' kind of person. Not my kind of tea. So the two youngests came back later. Don't know how, but they just did. I just want to swallow the angst.

Go crazy.

(Call me Ellestrade, btw :))

I wrote an entire thing for this and it deleted itself.

Needless to say, objects were thrown.

Ellestrade, I feel like you’d be the type of person to come across me at a store and go, “Hey, wassup with you? Nice, nice- ALSO, I came up with a new AU idea, okay, so get this-” and we’d spend my five minute shopping trip talking AU brother trauma for an hour or two.

You adore B-team aspect. I adore the big brothers desperately needing/missing their little brothers aspect. Donnie is just a wholesome creature in all regards.

“They got to die, actually. Temporarily, pronto.”

You get me. You really get me :’)

YAS. I can taste this. All of it. AND IT HURTS.

You have the big brother angst completely plotted out. Allow me to fill in all the blanks for what I’m imagining for the LITTLE brother’s side of angst. (Not saying it’s canon. It’s just on my brain. A little expansion on trauma never hurt anyone~)

Okay, so we all know how Mikey died. He was zapped away by a transportation ray from the Newtralizer. (How the heck did they survive that episode without him tho??)

In the actual episode, he comes back to life with his body fully intact. He rebuilds himself as if there was just a minor transporter glitch and- wowsa!- exactly where he planned to be. And the smirk on his face said that rebuilding was both awesome and intentional. Which means that while he didn’t have a body, his consciousness was definitely alive and alert in some way. And when he saw Raph in trouble, he did what Newtralizer does and got his body back.

HOW, exactly, that works? I couldn’t tell you. Something to do with particles and mass and transportation physics, I assume. The body is being stored away in a pocket dimension? Meh. That’s not important.

If Mikey has a way to get his body back in canon, then that means that he should have a way to get his body back in your AU. That’s how you could un-dead him. He figures it out.

But that begs the question, if he figured it out in the show super fast- Why can’t he in the AU?

He CAN. In fact, his body is CONSTANTLY trying to rebuild itself. But he can’t remember how he died. He thinks he’s a ghost. And every time he feels the energy build up and the tug of something against his core/spirit/ki, he gets terrified that his body is trying to pass on. But he doesn’t want to. He wants to stay here with his brothers. So he shoves down the vibrations and the energy and tears away the claws that pull him elsewhere, and he forces himself to stay.

And every time he fights it down- he blips out.

His spiritual form disappears and comes back. He has to go through the motions of figuring out his scrambled memories and why he’s being ignored and why his brothers are constantly screaming at each other or crying late at night. He has to relearn about his death over and over- broken every single time that he realizes that it’s his fault that his family is like this.

But what about Donnie?

He didn’t die in the same way that Mikey did. He was quite literally torn to pieces, past flesh and bone down to sparkly blue spirit. Za-Naron wanted to make sure that he was absolutely gone to the point that no one would be able to get him back. Without him there to reach April, the demon was confident that she would win.

But the process of complete elimination was interrupted by April. She was still fighting in there. And instead of erasing him off the face of the planet, he was simply shattered. His essence and very being was tossed all over the city in the sparkly blue explosion.

His self ends up in pieces- slots of memories that can’t learn or adapt or process past what they already know. The most recent piece, one made of up memories that tracks to the day before Donnie decides to test April’s power (and everything goes wrong), is in the lair.

He doesn’t understand that Mikey is supposed to be dead because Donnie died first. He can understand that Leo is crying, but it’s like something disconnects before he can process why. He knows that Raph just shoved passed, but the knowledge that he went straight through him isn’t a conscious realization. He knows that Mikey was standing there a moment ago, but the fact he flickered out of existence is replaced with the confidence that he’d simply walked past him, to his room or the kitchen.

Mikey is not dead because his body is still out there. Donnie isn’t dead because his spirit isn’t intact to pass on. Ergo, they stuck.

Neither realizes anything is off. They both see each other as solid, physical people. Donnie can’t comprehend that anything is wrong with him or Mikey. Mikey never quite remembers that Donnie is supposed to be dead.

At least, not until he goes above ground, and finds more Donatellos up there as well.

There’s one near a computer shop, stuck in the motions of gushing about how amazing the surface is. There’s another at the junkyard, muttering about the needed parts for the turtle mech. He finds a small Donnie, maybe five or six, crying and scared in the sewers, terrified when a Mikey who is not his little brother approaches, begging for his papa to find him.

Finally, Mikey realizes that something is absolutely wrong here.

And so, he seeks out the only person who might be able to help.

A certain banished April O’Neil who runs straight into a stop sign when he jumps out in front of her.

[dirichletttt]

My queue has run out

What is this account now, except an empty husk, occasionally documenting posts long gone by (3 months ago)?

[aita-blorbos]

AITA for “betraying” someone who had already betrayed me.

I’ve recently started working under someone, we’ll call him B for now, who claims to be working towards a common goal, a shared interest if you will. He claims to want to create a new, perfect world, however I have my own personal doubts about his true goals.

To start, when I first approached him, graciously offering my help, he refused. Not only was it insulting for him to spit upon my offer, not even bothering to consider it, it was also highly suspicious. After all, he would need my powers to actually create his perfect world, unless his idea of a “perfect world” was a mere barren wasteland.

So of course, when he returned to beg for me to join his team, I was cautious. Of course I wanted to believe him, I want a perfect world just as much as he claimed to. Perhaps that is why I had to keep such a close eye on him. After all, if he was lying, where would that leave me? Where would it leave his other minions? He had told them all the same thing. I wasn’t merely looking out for myself here, I was looking out for all of his minions!

I kept a close eye on B, listening in on his conversations. The most interesting ones were always the ones he had with his loyal assistant, N, and it was during one of these that he finally revealed his true goal. He had never planned to create a new world at all! No, he intended to destroy them, and leave them all as barren, empty husks! Of course, N seemed perfectly content to play along with his plans anyways.

I, on the other hand, actually wanted what I was promised. Which meant, of course, that I had to start working behind B’s back to get it, since he had no intention of keeping his word. Unfortunately, this did mean helping the heroes defeat him, but it truly is a small price to pay for a perfect world.

My plan was perfect, too. To defeat B, the heroes had to use their only hope of later defeating me, ancient creations made specifically to thwart B’s plan. And once they were used up, I could easily take B out and dispose of the heroes, with nothing available to stop me from carrying out the rest of the plan as promised.

But, somehow, this plan managed to fail! Through no fault of my own, of course, as I couldn’t have possibly accounted for this. Somehow, even after the heroes had used them up defeating B, their little magic artifacts came back to defeat me! As if I was the villain here!

Even worse than that, though, was that I later found out that they had returned because of the love that B and his minions had for each other! Because his minions were so sickeningly loyal to him that they either didn’t care that he had lied to them from the start or that they could never conceive of it happening! And, on top of that, they had the audacity to claim that I was the traitor for wanting what had been promised to me!

Is it really so heinous to want what was promised? Is it truly a betrayal when the one I’m “betraying” has been betraying me from the start?

[yanderelovlies]

More dante angst!!

Thanks to Trish and Lady, you had been sucked into the Urizen job much to Dante's dismay. He knew the job was gonna be dangerous, especially if Vergil was involved, but couldn't tell you otherwise. He had hoped that if they reached and defeated Urizen before you did, then there was less of a chance for you to get hurt.

What Dante didn't account for was to be knocked out by Urizen, leaving him unconscious for a month until V found him. V filled him on what happened since his disappearance. Even noting that Nero was heading Urizen as they spoke.

"What y/n? Are they at least safe?"

V stared at him as if collecting his thoughts, but before he could say anything, Griffon swooped down, landing beside Dante. "No one has seen them since the mission started. Lady thinks they might have had the same fate as her."

"Taken by Urizen as vessel."

Dante sat there for a bit before standing up. "Then I got a princess to save." Picking up the Devil sword, Sparda Dante swung it onto his shoulder as he began to saunter off. "Make sure Nero doesn't get there before I do. This isn't his fight."

V tried to call after the Devil hunter, but his calls fell to deaf ears. Finding you was whole drafting Urizen was his top priority.

.

Unfortunately, you were still nowhere to be seen. No demon Dante fought showed any characteristics or smell similar to yours, but he kept searching. Until he finally came up to the top once again.

When he opened the door again he expected an empty room like before. However, this time in the middle of the room sat a lone husk. It was on the floor looking crumbled and broken before being sucked of the blood it obtained.

"A little midnight snack huh big guy?"

Urizen lifted his head from fist, almost surprised Dante was standing before him. He said no words as the devil hunter walked around the husk.

Dante was about to kick the rest of the husk away when he spotted something familiar. Amongst the ash was the promise ring he had given you attached to a necklace. Dante could feel the world stop. This wasn't just any husk....it was yours.

"They came to me not long after you did. Foolish mortal. Their body was too weak and frail, so I put it to better use."

Dante just stared on your husk, unable to move. He could feel his whole world crumbling at the seams, and he didn't know how to handle it.

Tired of his hesitation, Urizen sent out two of his tendrils to pierce through Dante, but before they could hit two gunshots, they rang out, hitting both tendrils

"Come one, Dante!, get yo -" It didn't take long for Nero to piece it together. You didn't make it. This fight got more personal.

[st-writes]

Reach and Flexibility Pt. 2

ME2: Shepard gets a peek at the big guns

(Read Part 1 Here)

Shepard sat at the edge of the first medbay cot. Her palms were dry. Everything was dry. She felt like the traditional definition of a husk, her exterior hardened and leathery while inside her soul shriveled up, pulling away from the edges. It left a moat between her and the rest of the world, making everything seem distant.

Two days earlier they’d raided the collector ship. They’d gotten the data they needed and escaped without casualties. It was a success, but only in the sense that the directives had been fulfilled. In every other sense, Shepard didn’t think she’d ever felt like a bigger failure.

Two days earlier they’d raided the collector ship, and she’d been mentally spaced by her own psyche, set adrift in her nightmares while her body was left panicked and vulnerable in the belly of the beast.

“I wouldn’t have sent you in if I didn’t think you could succeed,” he’d said.

Shepard winced as Chakwas’s gloved hands manipulated her cheek, pinching the skin around the growing, glowing fissures. The pain was dull, but still there. Chakwas tutted and stepped away, tugging her gloves off by the fingers.

“Other than a rejection flare-up, you appear to be fine, physically. But I’m a medical doctor, Commander. When it comes to matters of the mind, I can only be a friend,” she said, setting the gloves on her desk.

“I’m not talking to Chambers.” Shepard yanked her sleeves down. “You know those reports are just going straight to the Illusive Man’s desk.” By his account, he’d led her into the lion’s den because he believed she could get herself out. What would he do if he knew his game piece was broken, his weapon impotent, his investment squandered?

“I wish you would talk to someone.” Chakwas slumped into her chair with a sigh. “Your experience is not unique, even if your circumstances are. You don’t have to deal with this alone.”

Shepard snorted. “Well, I wish we hadn’t finished all your brandy in one go.”

The corners of Chakwas’s mouth curled upward, but the smile fell short of reaching her eyes. “Are you sleeping alright? I can give you something that will help.”

Shepard ran a hand through her hair before tucking it behind her ears. “I’m sleeping plenty.” Not entirely true. The first night had been a breeze-- she’d barely made it to her cabin. EDI had let her sleep well into what was supposed to be the waking part of her cycle, and she fought a residual grogginess until it was nearly time for her to sleep again. As a result, she waited up the second night until her eyes were raw from pouring over reports and she was forced to lay on her couch and focus on nothing in particular until sleep found her.

“Alright.” Chakwas, with an air of reluctance, spun her chair back slowly toward her desk. “Do let me know if any other issues arise, or… if you want to talk…”

“I know where to find you.” Shepard nodded, moving to the door. “Thanks, Karin.” After a few steps she peered back through the window to make sure the doctor wasn’t watching her, and changed course from the elevator to the mess. She’d need coffee if she was going to make much sense of EDI’s findings beyond the overview.

The pot was empty and Gardner was off doing the other half of his duties that no one really cared to think about, so Shepard set to work brewing a new one. She found herself hypnotized by the sporadic drip, so much so that she didn’t notice one of her team had come up beside her.

“Shepard.” Garrus materialized from the haze of her surroundings to greet her. “It’s good to see you up. How are you feeling?”

“Fine,” she responded automatically, before realizing who had asked: a good friend with a front-row seat to her meltdown. She glanced at him with sheepish alarm.

His avian eyes, somehow always as enigmatic as they were expressive, watched her for a moment. The good mandible on his left made one idle twitch as he seemed to reach some sort of conclusion. He gave her a small nod. “Glad to hear it,” he said. “Do you have a minute?”

There was something about him not calling her out on her bullshit that made her feel incredibly called out on her bullshit. She tried her best not to look admonished as she turned to face him. “What do you need?”

“I wanted to show you something.” A note close to mischief crept into his voice. “I think you’ll like it.”

Too worn out to have her interest truly piqued, Shepard frowned skeptically as she gestured loosely toward the coffee maker. “More than coffee?”

Garrus’s browplates dipped briefly downward as his eyes followed her hand. “Hm. Can’t say, haven’t tried the stuff.” He looked back at her, mandible tilted in what she’d come to read as a smirk. “But yeah, I think so.”

Shepard raised her eyebrows; he didn’t know what a high bar he’d just set for himself. “Alright, Vakarian. I’ll bite. Show me.”

“Great.” Garrus straightened and started toward the corridor to his usual haunt and makeshift quarters, beckoning her along. “Follow me to the battery.”

She fell in line behind him, with some small, distant amusement taking note of an energy in his stride--a “spring in his step”--she hadn’t seen in a long time. It was the gait of a younger iteration, a Garrus Vakarian eager and excited, impatient for whatever comes next. What could possibly merit that?

Once inside the battery, he pressed a tablet into her hands before stepping over to his console. She looked down at it, trying unsuccessfully to find enough focus to read the scrolling data. “What am I looking at?” She asked.

“You asked, before, if a turian patrol could’ve disabled the collector ship. We know now that’s not what happened… but it got me thinking. So I did a little poking around.” Shepard looked back up, then looked again. The interior of the battery was overlaid with a hologram- new holographic parts integrated into the current, physical setup.

“These are Thanix Cannons,” Garrus said, spinning back toward her from where he’d been queueing up the hologram at his console. “They fire a liquid alloy core suspended in an electromagnetic field that’ll tear through just about anything. Our military reverse engineered them from Sovereign’s main gun. Reaper-grade weapons, Shepard. Those Collector bastards try anything again, they won’t know what hit them.”

Garrus’s energy was contagious. Shepard felt her mouth pulling into a smile as she looked over the data with refreshed eyes. The back of her neck prickled as understanding began to sink in. “And we can make this happen?”

“Definitely. Easy upgrade.” Garrus stepped to her, tapping the tablet and clearing his throat. “Once we get the parts, of course. But I can’t imagine Cerberus won’t write this check.”

Shepard’s grin had grown so much it was hurting her scarred cheeks. The corners of her eyes began to burn, threatening tears. For the first time since she’d been brought back, the phantom Collector ship in her mind was paired with imagery of its own destruction, not hers. “Vakarian, I could kiss you.”

“Easy there, Shepard. I don’t want you to have to sit through that vid again on my account,” Garrus chuckled, taking the tablet out of her hands. He regarded her for a moment before tapping it gently against her arm. “You’ve had a long, hard couple of days. I thought you could use a win.”

Wearing a tempered smile she brushed him away, for a moment the touch of his forearm against hers almost eclipsing her other senses. They joked, but she could actually kiss him. She could do more than kiss him. Her eyes swept over him, gaging the feasibility of a whim her fatigued brain would not let pass. “Speaking of, um, Turian ingenuity...”

“Hm?” Garrus, who had just begun to move back to the console, stopped himself.

She re-crossed her arms. “I’ve been thinking about what you said-- about relieving tension.”

Garrus mirrored her gesture. “I uh, didn’t think you’d feel like sparring, Commander.” He leaned toward her conspiratorially. “You look a little tired.”

And she was: too tired to mince words. Shepard tried to smile, but it ended up feeling more like a grimace. She watched his eyes. “Yeah, not what I meant.”

Realization dawned slowly over his face. His mandibles went slack for a moment before flicking back up with a thoughtful tic. The plates on his nose flexed, his browplates tilted upward. “Oh! I didn’t… Huh.” Garrus shifted his weight onto his back foot and tugged at his collar. He turned his head toward the console, then back toward her, mandibles twitching restlessly. “You said I was ugly,” he reminded her, more confusion in his voice than reproach.

Shepard shrugged helplessly. “Looks aren’t everything,” she said. Had he taken that playful ribbing to heart? She hadn’t meant it. Though she hadn’t thought him particularly attractive then either, now she found her interest… piqued. “Maybe I changed my mind.”

Garrus was visibly floundering, his fidgeting more pronounced. “Is it the scars?” he joked, taking refuge in humor. “Never knew you had a weakness.”

“Sure as hell wasn’t your lines.” Shepard smirked. She glanced over at the hologram, still shimmering over the battery’s machinery. “Might’ve been the gun talk.”

“That cannon is a sexy machine,” Garrus agreed. When Shepard looked back, she found him watching, studying her. “Sorry. I’ve just never considered--- seriously, anyway,” he corrected himself after catching her look.

“Right, sounds like a no.” Her smirk tensed into something more like a grimace, and she rubbed at the spot between her eyebrows with a knuckle, as if she could smudge the whole idea out. “Sorry. I hope I didn’t make you uncomfortable.”

“It’s not-! I—“ He huffed helplessly. “You don't ever have to worry about making me uncomfortable. Nervous, yes... but never uncomfortable. I just… I know you can find something a little closer to home.”

She squinted up at him through her hand. “Like who? Jack? Miranda?”

“Jacob?” Garrus suggested meekly. “...Joker? Zaeed? I mean, even Thane has…”

“Garrus,” she cut him off, waving away his suggestions like gnats. “Don’t be ridiculous. You’re my best friend, one of the few people I can trust. I never feel closer to home out here than when I’m with you.”

If she’d had more sleep, if she wasn’t raw and burnt out she might’ve been surprised at her nearly embarrassing earnestness. But if she wasn’t raw and burnt out she probably wouldn’t have been embarrassingly earnest.

Garrus straightened a little, regarding again with a look that was…softer. “I get that.” He nodded, his mandible twitching. “You’re about the only friend I’ve got left in this screwed up galaxy. I’m not going to pretend I’ve got a fetish for humans, but… If this is about us?”

His head tilted and he took a step back. “You know what? Yeah. Why the hell not.”

Shepard let slip an incredulous laugh. “‘Why the hell not’?”

“What?”

“Garrus! ‘Why the hell not’?” She stared, waiting for the penny just wouldn’t drop. “I mean, I think that’s everyone’s favorite response to putting themselves out there.”

“Definitely,” he corrected himself, sounding almost resolute before he kept on talking. “If we can figure out a way to make it work, then… Definitely.”

“It’s not uncharted territory, Big Guy.” Shepard shrugged sympathetically. She wasn’t familiar with any turian-human couplings herself, but there were definitely asari who took turian partners, so it couldn’t be too far a leap. All it took was knowing your own body, communication, and a can-do attitude, as far as she was concerned.

“Right… So… I’ll do some research,” he proffered, obviously coming from a very different, more cautious philosophy. “Find some music…?”

It was a little adorable. Shepard patted his arm supportively, feeling the fatigue creep back in. Excitement and nerves had invigorated her, but the wave of relief that came over her as their conversation settled seemed to wash her energy away with it. She never did get her coffee. “Do what you need to do, Vakarian, and nothing you don’t want to.”

His mandibles and mouthplates twitched as a series of responses died silently on his tongue. She’d broken him, she thought with distant amusement, but he’d bounce back.

“And please, PLEASE, forward those specs for the cannons to Lawson as soon as possible.” Her intention had been bringing their conversation to a merciful close, not to reignite the hot bloom of gratitude within her, but there it was. She found herself staring at that spot on his forehead.

“Can I…?” She gestured hesitantly.

“Hm?”

“Kiss you. Actually.” A light laugh bubbled through her voice. There was a giddiness now, amusement at his bafflement and her own persistent ridiculousness floating like flotsam on whatever emotional mess churned in the depths of her psyche.

Garrus sighed, a quiet exhale with a stutter at the end that could have been a laugh. “Alright.” He opened his arms and lowered his head for her.

Placing her hands on either side of his head, she guided her face to his and pressed her lips gently to that spot where the three sections of his forehead plating met. “Thank you,” she murmured against the cool, hard surface, and felt him shudder beneath her. His hands found her wrists and encased them in a soft but firm hold.

Did she stumble over a line again? She pulled back, watching him carefully as he watched her. There was something intense about the look in his eye, not alarm or reproach but… something.

“Well.” Shepard gave him a half apologetic smirk and an ineffectual pat on the hard plating that seemed to essentially form an exo-cheekbone. “I have some reports to look over, and gallons of coffee to drink, so… I’ll leave you to it?”

He let go of her with a wry chuckle, running his hands up over his own fringe. His blue eyes shot her a good-natured glare. “Riiight. 'Cause I'm in a great place to optimize firing algorithms right now. “

She shrugged, sympathetic but impotent, as she triggered the door control. Sounds from the mess filtered in on the heels of the door’s mechanical hiss. Garrus straightened, his blue eyes sliding warily over the scene behind her before meeting her gaze again. He shook his head and waved her away with the casual gesture of a good friend.

Shepard nodded in acknowledgement and turned, remnants of a smile lingering at the corners of her mouth. Two days ago, they raided the Collector ship, and the same specter that killed her two years prior had unmade her again. The Lazarus’s time, money, and scientific genius all brought to ruin with the sharp sting of betrayal and the unsteady lurch of a platform. Two days ago she was, in some ways, as two years ago- meat and tubes, raw and exposed, a lost cause. Today, healing began again. Not on a gurney, not under a knife, not with stitches and cybernetics, but in the arms of a friend, under their protection, with kindness and caring—and some very big guns.

Everything was going to be okay. And even better with coffee.

[senkothewarlock]

DWC #1

@daily-writing-challenge

A twin story about Sethrak and Senko.

Day 1: Casualty & Flirt

The buffering winds swept up the large cliff face near Teerakai. Clan banners of the Centaur swayed with each gust. The ethereal groan of the air blended in with the macabre howls of ancestors’ past in the burial grounds. A top of a small rock, sat crossed legged, was our titular character, Senko. Her butterscotch fur brushed back by the gales as the piercing breeze caused her amber eyes to get wet. She pulled her silk collar up, her only conscious movement as she withdrew into her meditation.

Senko was a brooder. While the others ate and drank around the fire in the camp, she remained on the outskirts. Gazing off towards where Amirdrassil had sprouted. Her robes, still caked with gore and dust from skirmishes past, offered her warmth in place of company. She had helped to lead this caravan for three, soon-to-be four years at this point. Yet her mind still casted the shadows of doubt onto her.

A hand had been placed on Senko’s shoulder, rocking the cold steel and emerald gem forward. It was the only person to offer inner warmth: her fiancée and guiding light, Oonee. Wordlessly, she nestled in by the side of Senko, two glasses in hand as she placed one quietly into Senko’s grasp.

“Ever the brooder.” She teased, running a spare hand up her ashen fur to warm herself up. “Darling, you better not be like this on our wedding night.”

“Perish the thought.” Senko stated, taking a long swig of whatever she’d been given.

Oonee’s claws scratched at the layer of visceral that had accumulated onto Senko’s purple robes. She gave a small tut-tut as she began to flick the dried remains off of her polished, ebon nails before dusting the debris off.

“I hope you gave as good as you got in that fight, my love. These are filthy.”

Senko’s stoicism broke into a small chuckle as she glanced down at her partner, who now lounged on her lap. She took a swig and clinked glass together. Senko looked at the cleaned part of her robes and back to her lover’s eyes. No-one knew, but she had dyed her robes to be the same colour as Oonee’s eyes, a piece of her to always be at her side.

“Well, you know me…” Senko started. “Filthy robes, filthy mind.”

A small smirk broke out on both of their faces. Oonee placed a thumb across Senko’s scars that flowed from her eyes. To the uninitiated they were nothing more than streaks of mascara but to those who knew her, they were the marks of fate. Oonee broke the smirk-off first.

“I also know that you’re dirty in words and deeds, darling.” She affirmed, taking another swig.

“And what’s that meant to mean~?” Senko pressed, canting her head to the side with a sly grin.

“It means,” Oonee began, gently tapping Senko’s head. “That I would always bet on you in a fight. All those nasty tricks of yours.”

Senko took a long swig; she wasn’t one to nurse a drink. Having Fel rampage through her system at least meant that most drinks would burn up while being digested, no hangovers for this Vulpera.

“What’s got you all broody tonight then?” She was asked. Oonee pulling herself up, arm around Senko as she snuggled into her lap.

“Reflection.” Senko started, placing the now empty whisky tumbler on the rocks. “Last time I was back home was about four years ago to the month. Seven if we account for the time we missed on our ‘excursion’.”

Oonee’s ears perked up as she held onto Senko tightly.

“When you-…?”

“Yep.”

SEVEN YEARS AGO, VOL’DUN

The sand, now superheated to the point of glass, broke beneath the hurried feet of soldiers. The roar of flames crackled in the night sky. Thunder deafened by the sound of the inferno and the crackling hiss of buildings collapsing. An entire village, one of many, that had shared the fate of hellfire that night.

Mass graves were in the process of being dug as the robed official weaved through the crowd of soldiers. His serpentine frame clenching a sceptre as guards and soldiers dragged away the desiccated husks of what were once Sethrak.

“How many?” The official asked, finally catching up to the Skycarver.

“Thisss marksss the fifth village. We’re up to a few thousssand dead.”

“Zandalari?”

“No. Not even the Devoted were sssspared.” The Skycarver said, rubbing a hand across his hood.

The pair surveyed the smouldering village, once known as a jewel in the Sethrak empire, Bhani Vissak now was naught more than collapsed burrows and burnt-out houses. The fire that danced in the air had a sickly, green tint to the tips. The empire had faced setback after setback – but to lose so many souls in one night would have finally put the boot down on the neck.

“Any leadsss?” The official asked.

“Not yet, but the printsss… They look like our sssslavess’.”

The official’s focus broke as one of the bodies was carried past. He stopped the guard before placing his hand on the withered remains of a hand and slid the bangle off. His fingers shook and whatever emotion a snake had would catch in his throat. He read the name to himself, internally and externally, several times. His daughter. Dead in his hands. The golden band had burnt with the pyres, burnt onto the emaciated finger. The faint letters, written in the damnable script of the Sethrak once read ‘Sakassith”.

“Sssskycarver,” the official spoke once more. “I want namessss. Headsss.”

The Skycarver looked around the ravaged lands. The Empire had little influence, even before being eviscerated. But now? With a handful of villages and a collection of deluded Sethrak, to find results would take ages. A lifetime, perhaps. The Skycarver had to think quick. Fast. He finally drew breath to respond.

“I will sssend my ssscoutsss to look at the Devoted, it may have been an act of incitement.”

“I do not care if it wassss! I jussst want thossse resssponsssible. Dead at my feet, hung from our rocksss.” The official said, ash now staining his crimson cape.

“Assss you wisssh, Viceroy.” The Skycarver acknowledged, bowing before he ran off into the dunes.

The Viceroy glanced at the mass graves. Huge pits had been excavated around the ruins, some as deep as the burrows that were once called homes. He watched, wordlessly, as his own heir was thrown into the pits. Glass cracked beneath his feet as he walked over the scorched surface. A burrow, collapsed, breaking the silence as plumes of sand billowed up into the air.

He would have his revenge.

[disneyanddisneyships]

@gyubby99 this is gonna be sad.

Alastor x OC fic

Warnings: self harm, mentions of abuse, trauma, and r*pe. Read with caution please. Especially yu julia. This is gonna be triggering

Aponi stood in the bathroom, the mirror fogging up as the shower ran.

Another nightmare.

It felt so real...

Tears ran down her face silently before she sighed and took the small metal bathroom scissors from their place and she began hurting herself.

She winced at some if the pain as some blood made itself known from her thighs and wrists.

She threw the scissors into the sink and got into the shower, hissing at the water running down the fresh wounds.

Alastor woke up alone in Aponi's bedroom. He never fell asleep there usually, but he's been getting more relaxed ever since they started to try to be better people together.

They had spent the entire night talking and cuddling with one another, and along the way Alastor assumed he fell asleep.

But that still didn't account for the missing butterfly demon who was SUPPOSED to be sleeping next to him.

That's when he heard a small crash in the bathroom.

"Shit!" Aponi yelled.

Alastor walked into the bathroom to see his girlfriend, blood on her thighs and wrists bending down to pick up a sharp pair of scissors.

"Al?" Aponi asked as she stood back up before realizing she had blood on her thighs and wrists. "Its.. its nothing....." she trailed off.

"Darling.... why would you do that to yourself?" Alastor asked.

"Well it's not like it's the first time," Aponi chuckled as if to try to make a joke.

All alastor did was stare at her.

"Look its... I had a nightmare last night and I woke up just remembering things and i.... I wanted to feel something other than empty," Aponi explained.

"But darling... this?" Alastor stated with pleading eyes and a struggling smile as he grabbed her wrist, earning a wince from Aponi. He let her go. "Come on. Husk has a first aid kit in the kitchen," he stated before handing her, her robe and taking her downstairs.

"Hey guys, what's up?" Husk asked as the two walked downstairs.

"First aid kit, please, my friend!" Alastor exclaimed.

"Uh and a coffee?" Aponi asked.

"Comin right up," husk replied before heading into the kitchen.

Alastor and Aponi sat at the bar as Husk returned with the first aid.

He went into the bar to start the coffee.

"Let me see, darling," Alastor muttered with his hand held out for hers.

She sighed before doing as he said.

Alastor took some cleaning wipes and began to clean and disinfect it.

Husk glanced at her wrist.

"Angel is gonna be pissed when he finds out," Husk stated.

"That's why we're not telling him. He... doesn't know.... he thinks I stopped like 10 years ago," Aponi explained.

Alastor put a bandaid on Aponi's wrist before moving to her thighs and scooting closer to her.

"You're tellin me with all the short skirts you wear angel never notices the cuts?" Husk asked.

"Do you?" Aponi asked in return.

"Well no, but-"

"Why woukd you, my friend? You already know not to look at my girlfriend in that way do you not?" Alastor asked with a menacing smile, not lookingbup from his work.

"Uh.....right. You're right. I'd NEVER look at her that way. Ever." Husk sputtered.

Aponi giggled before wincing at the pain in her thighs.

"Hold still, darling," Alastor muttered.

"Right.... sorry Al," Aponi stated.

As alastor finished up he sat up straighter. "Any other ones i should know about before I put this away?" He asked.

"I only had time for the thighs and one arm. Thanks Al," Aponi replied.

"Of course, my Darling, but..... I still don't understand," he muttered.

"Its.... like an addiction I guess.... kind of the once you start, you may stop for a while but then you'll relapse kind of addiction....." she explained.

Alastor sighed before hugging her close and kissing her forehead.

"I should go get dressed. I'll be right back," Aponi stated before standing up and wlaking to her room. A few minutes later she came back down in ripped jeans and a baggy t shirt.

Alastor raised an eyebrow. He had never seen her in something that modest before.

"What?" Aponi asked. "The cuts are fresh and I'm not putting makeup on them or over the band aids. I dont wanna look more tacky than I already do most of the time," Aponi joked.

[agerefandom]

Regressor!Adam (Frankenstein) Headcanons

the monster, at first, does not know what age is, and once he learns, he is no more certain of what that means for him 

age is yet another way that he is not right: he is both adult and child, pieces stitched together just like the limbs that move under his control 

his mind works quickly, as if it was ready to grow, but there are gaps and absences, and in anger his mind seems so empty of everything but the blinding emotion 

he watches the family in the forest, watches the generations of father and daughter and baby, and he knows that there is no place where he belongs in this hierarchy 

but he wants, he wants to be held and taught like the child: he tries to satisfy himself with the overheard lessons and the stolen books, but he’s desperate for something that words can’t satisfy, some kind of truer contact

when he reaches out for that, he goes to the elder, prostrates himself at his feet and is called son in a kind and welcoming voice, and then everything goes wrong, his hands red with blood and his feet crunching on twigs as he flees 

he makes dolls out of corn husks and rough twine, cradles and teaches them the same way he wishes someone would treat him, but often the irony, the insufficiency, burns hot in him and the husk dolls fall to pieces in his grip 

reading Paradise Lost, he finds a figure that speaks to him in Adam, but there is no God to give the monster his lessons, to bless him with land to tend and animals to name: he takes Adam’s name as a promise to himself, that he will hold his own Creator accountable 

still, he struggles against himself: the child who wants to beg for acceptance, the child who wants nothing but to scream and tear and ruin, the adult who burns for a colder vengeance, and the adult who sees that Victor Frankenstein could be useful (could give him a family, a wife or a sister, and all he’s ever wanted is a family, please give him a family, he’ll do anything to get one-) 

good weather brings out the child inside, some happy space inside him where he can almost forget all he’s been cursed to never have: instead there is soft moss and warm sunlight and mountain streams that run over his feet, deer in the bushes scattering from his footsteps: but as soon as  storm clouds gather, he remembers his first night of life and his anger comes back to him, drowning out any enjoyment he had 

[thesalemwitchtries]

Daredevil WIP Snippet

Alright, so I've written a few fics in the past, and only ever posted one, but I've been working on a Daredevil idea for a little bit, and I've never posted anything here, but I want to just go for it. Like, it's fun, also who cares, yk?

I mean objectively the idea is fairly self-indulgent to my interests lately, but that's also why I like it so much. There's a technopath reader character, who will be given a name and conditionally uses they/them pronouns. There will be some awkwardness from her as she was raised in isolation, and also occasional themes of depersonalization due to her powers, I'll tag all of that to be safe.

Hopefully I'll do it, I'm gonna post this snippet just to like, create something to hold myself accountable with later.

But also that means I'll have to actually figure out how to use tumblr... huh. Mostly idk how to format text at all.

Snippet below, feedback encouraged and appreciated <3

Charlotte called it Syncing: taking an imaginary leash off of her consciousness and allowing it to float away, dissolving from physical sensation, from her emotion and identity, she became it, more than Charlotte and less than human. 

There was no real feeling to it at all. She was, then it was, and together they were, no pause or breath between states, but Syncing seemed like the closest anyone could come to knowing what death felt like. The body stayed behind, just enough electricity to keep the meat fresh and responsive, cardio-vascular systems operating at a typical resting capacity. 

The soul though, transformed, ascended into Cyberspace and stretched itself wide and far, the way they were meant to be. 

World Wide Web was a shockingly apt name to come from people who couldn’t see this dimension the way that they could. Beams of light flashed the binary patterns of ones and zeros, altogether making up the vastness of human existence as it could be known so far.

Governments, banks, every old lady posting photos of their grandchildren on Facebook, it all was there, tangled together through pathways like wires, data connections forming junctions in a large spider's web. 

For the most part, Charlie experienced the Cyberspace as a place beyond both tangibility and sense, there wasn’t anything to see or hear unless they traveled to a connection that represented a camera or microphone in the Real world. Instead they operated through feeling, a superior knowing that they had always had within the Cyberspace. 

In the Real, it took Charlie years to learn code, here they wove it together like Arachne, no doubt or struggle, chains of code and subroutines molded exactly as they wished. They were the sole inhabitant and queen of an entire universe, this dimension of information, where they could create and do without limit. 

It was here, a place of life beyond breath, that they had found it. 

Charlotte had wanted a copy of some schematics, so she Synced and they began to search through data connections of the inventor, routing the plans away to her own meticulously guarded network to study back in the Real. Just as they were about to De-sync, they found it— a data connection that felt wrong. 

Hastily tied and weak, like it didn’t belong and was ready to disappear without a trace at a moment’s notice. 

Wires, strands, and connections often reflected the way that they were created outside of the Cyberspace, viruses and bugs had a particular way that they were knotted and attached to the main web, and this wire was a classic Shadow. Shadows were fairly common, almost every system had a few things locked further away from the Main Web than usual. They required caution though, as many belonged to the Law, and others to people operating Illegally.

Creating a subroutine to follow the strand of information to its other possible connections, they found it was something illegal, leading to various husks and shells— empty connections that were meant to fool anyone searching. That would work for others, accessing the Cyberspace from the Real, but they couldn’t be fooled, not here. 

More subroutines spun from their fingers, traveling down the strands and across numerous connections, dipping through security feeds and into microphones. They found empty offices, an upscale apartment, warehouses with people all in rows, a group of women screaming by the docks. 

While they couldn’t feel or sense while Synced, the part of them that was her identified what was as close to a sinking sensation as could exist outside of the Real. This was bad, evil, rotten. This Shadow was just one fragile part of a larger section of the Web, one that twisted and decayed, spreading flesh-viruses across the Real. 

Charlotte had to stay hidden, couldn’t let others notice that she was here, that they could do so much. Still, they could do so much, they could help, and so they must help. They refused to be like others that they had known, who looked at her with pity and remorse and yet never helped.

They would do something, just a little at first, and then keep an eye on things. 

Searching through the Shadow they dissolved the extra subroutines, coming across the perfect piece of bait. One file, loosely tethered but linked to all of the wrongness built here. They made a copy, innocuous, and tacked it to an email from one of the flesh-viruses to an account that was unconnected to all the wrongness. The date and time were modified, all traces of their tampering erased, and they De-synced, returning to the weary body.

The next morning, Karen Page checked her email, and opened the attached file labeled ‘Pension_Master’.

[ukusreticence]

Hi <3 just wanted know is there any difference between Side A and side B's eldritch forms? and how do you draw those form(s)? I also just wanted to clarify:

Side A is the sparkly cosmos one, mainly introverted, did not go kaiju in heaven (?)

Side B is more shy than introverted, kinda more social, went kaiju in heaven (?)

Also, what's your artfight account? Thank you!

holy flip a legitimate ask about my characters aaa

artfight account is serinuku

the rest of the character stuff under the cut

-

Side A doesn't actually have any "Eldritch" form because they're not eldritch! They're actually more robotic/mechanical than eldritch ahah. I have played around with the thought of them having a more biblically accurate angel looking form but none of the concepts I made appeal to me so I kinda just put it on hold.

The main difference between Dyrkethiel Side A and Side B is that while they're both different from typical angels in their own way, One is mostly robotic and closer to an android while the other is a literal eldritch abomination.

Also yes Side A is the sparkly cosmos one who wishes he can snap your neck for bothering him (all bark no bite he's just easily agitated) and he didn't go kaiju but he did do a thing. If i get over my embarrassment of my own concepts/ideas I may share what thing he did. All I will say is that BOTH versions aren't particularly liked by God for different reasons. All I will say is that this reason is one of the reasons i ended up coming with Estorciel's existence ahaha

colored coded details/extra bits below and the color correct and clothed version as well from the first Dyrkethiel post. (Ignore the proportions please i am sobbing over them but already wrote all the text ack) This is technically just their non humanoid form but eh close enough to eldritch. The mechanical pattern might not stick and sorta came up with it on the fly

Side B, i'm still experimenting with their personality but yeah sounds about right. The whole kaiju in heaven/turning into their true form thing was mostly self indulgent but it depends on the universe you plop them into and the events. Altho in theory if they did actually go into their true form, chances of many lesser angels having their minds break so there's only husks is actually incredibly high which is why I only play around with the idea for self indulgent purposes.

So, guess the answer to that is whatever you feel like doing since I made both of these to put into other universes, I'm bad at coming up with my own completely unique ones ahaha.

Drawing their comprehensible form is kinda hard to explain since its just... doodling. doodling mostly. But their true form is actually a lot easier than it looks.

i usually then just absolutely flood the picture with squiggles or lines depending on how complex i wanna be. For certain things I just do the first two tendril layers.

I will say that i like, don't have a consistent design for the tendril placements and such, it's just a bunch of lines and squiggles. Just kinda a lot of branching too. Same with the gradients and stuff. Reason this one is not as detailed as this one is because i used a really massive canvas and brush for that picture and a LOT of repeating step two.

im so sorry if this is not what you meant when you asked how i drew them pfff. didnt quite get the question but at the same time my head is very very empty right now.